MASTER COLUMNS GOOD FIT
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23
By
Debbie Diller
Conditions for Successful Literacy Stations
I believe that successful literacy stations begin with strong instruction. Stations are for practice of what you have already taught well. It is important to think about what you’re teaching, why this is important, and how students can best learn and then practice this. This is true for online or in-person instruction.
For example, if you plan to teach students about characters and their relationships, explain that this will help children better understand what happens in a story—the plot. Model by thinking aloud about characters and how they interact as you read aloud stories. Use a conversation card, an index card with a speech bubble containing a sentence stem, to help students use related academic vocabulary. It might say, “The main characters in this story are ____________. Their relationship is _________. When they ___________, I knew __________.”
To help students work successfully at stations, teach routines well and let children know what you expect. Teach the whole class how to do independent reading. Make an anchor chart with your students showing what this time looks like, sounds like, and feels like when it’s going well. Have children turn and talk to the person sitting beside them about the book they chose, why they chose it, and what they hope to find out as they read. After independent reading time, have them turn and tell their partner what they found out. When students show that they know how to do this well, you can open an independent reading station.
Be sure that students can do the work you place at a station. Do not put new materials there that students have never seen before or expect them to try something totally unfamiliar. Use materials students have seen in whole or small group; give them familiar materials and tasks to build their confidence and skill. For example, move big books you have taught with in whole group that students can read to a big book station to read with a partner. Place little books from small group for rereading with a friend at the partner reading station. Move a familiar laminated graphic organizer you have already taught with to a listening and speaking station for children to fill out together with dry erase pens.
What I Learned
As I met with teachers online through conferences, book studies, and other training sessions, I learned a great deal. First, there was little consistency. The way people were running schools differed between buildings, sometimes even within the same school system. We were doing our best, but things often changed weekly. Teachers were doing what they were asked to do, but many were uncomfortable with the way they were doing school. In some schools, teachers met with many children online. In others, most of the students were at school buildings. Many school systems had a camera on the teacher during instructional time so that kids at home could watch the teaching while the teacher simultaneously tried to teach kids in the classroom. It was difficult to design anything that would help everyone.
Originally, I created literacy stations to provide meaningful work for children to do while the teacher met with a small group for differentiated instruction. But with COVID, many teachers were not meeting with small groups at school. And when teachers met with children online in small groups, the rest of the class was not actually in the room.
So I focused my work on what literacy stations would look like when teachers were in physical classrooms with most of their children there. In these rooms, teachers found ways to have students work with partners at literacy stations. Students worked together on familiar tasks using familiar materials just as they had pre-COVID. A few things were different:
· Students might sit on individual rugs spaced several feet apart and each held their own copy of a book for the partner reading stations. They still read and talked about the book.
· Children read on their own at the independent reading station. Some used a classroom library for this while others had students sit at their seats to read by themselves. They could still talk with each other about what they read and share books with their classmates.
· In some classrooms, kids had a clear acrylic divider between them, so they could still see each other and talk about what they were learning. They used this setup for partner reading, independent reading, and listening and speaking stations.
· A clear acrylic divider could be placed between two students sitting at a small table or two small desks at a writing station. They could see what each other wrote and talk about their writing.
· Students returned materials to a storage space and used hand sanitizer between stations.
· Students always wore masks during stations as they interacted with each other.
Children in these classrooms were doing fairly well. Kids were happy to be at school with other students and their teachers in these elementary classrooms. There were no (or limited) COVID cases at these schools, so children were in school most of the year.
I also met with teachers who were doing some online instruction. They really missed doing small groups and stations. They were often so busy trying to keep up with online demands of creating videos and assignments that stations and small groups were not at the top of their lists. I noticed common themes among their struggles:
· Many (or some) children were not regularly attending class meetings or completing assignments.
· Teachers missed having kids work at stations with a partner. They could formulate work for students to do alone, but they could not put K-1 children in breakout rooms to work with another child without an adult online.
· Often children were not having opportunities to talk with a partner about what they were learning. It was difficult to incorporate “turn and talk” into their lessons, unless the children were talking to an adult at home who assisted with their online learning.
· It was challenging for children to develop oral language and academic vocabulary unless they met in small groups.
· Students often did not show up to small group meetings. Or their adults at home told them the answers or problem-solved new words when reading in small groups.
As schools prepare to open again across the country, I am talking with teachers about what their literacy stations might look like. Many are thinking about setting up their classrooms to have a whole group meeting area with a rug, a small group table, and an independent reading station/classroom library. Children will most likely be wearing masks and using hand sanitizer between stations. But I hope that educators will weigh the risks and decide to give children opportunities to work with partners again using some of the above suggestions.
Students need to talk with each other; they need to socialize; they need to use language as they learn. This is especially true where children may not have been able to attend school online or in person. Stations will be needed more than ever! So will small group instruction.
I recommend thinking about what children will be able to do independently starting in those first days of their return to the classroom. What did they know how to do online that can also be done in person? For example, if you established independent reading time online, transfer that to the classroom. Set a timer. Use the same routines children followed online. But let them read print books and talk with partners face-to-face about the books they are reading. You may need to place books read in a bin to be sanitized for a few days, but that’s an easy adaptation.
I recommend that we think about how to plan a joyous return to school for our students! Think about what they already know how to do and what they’ve missed. They know how to maneuver many online learning platforms. Continue to use some of these for stations, but have students work together rather than alone. They have missed their friends, their classrooms, their school buildings, their safe places for learning.
Celebrate what they know, what they can do, and what they want to learn about. Give them opportunities to work beside and with each other. Have them pursue inquiry about topics of interest and share skills they may have developed during their time being at home. Instead of looking at them as “second-graders” or “kids who missed a year of learning,” think of them as learners along a continuum. Build upon what they know, establish routines and be consistent, and help them continue to grow as children. They are resilient and want to learn.
Revisit literacy stations as a valuable part of your day. I’ve written about each station in depth in my new Simply Stations series. Start with one station and get to know it well. Build your stations with your students, one at a time. You might begin with the partner reading station to give children support in reading. It is fun to read with another person, and you can work together to help each other. After students know how to do partner reading, teach them how to do independent reading. Then have half the class do partner reading while the other half does independent reading. After they can do that well, layer on a listening and speaking station. Have students listen to the same text and then respond to it together.
Work with your colleagues. Do a book study together. Plan and begin to build anew. Use literacy stations as part of your day to grow oral language, enhance learning, and motivate students as they learn to work together again.
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